We Real Cool By Gwendolyn Brooks Analysis

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Imagery is a key tool authors use when writing a poem. When authors use imagery it helps the reader see what is going on in the poem. It gives the reader a mental picture that can change as the poem progresses. Imagery uses all of the senses: sight, smell, touch, hearing, and taste. In the poems “ The Bean Eaters,” We Real Cool,” and “miss rosie” imagery is used to touch the reader’s sense of sight.. The use of descriptive words and maybe even a picture with the poem is how imagery is defined. It is the most important thing about a poem, without imagery there wouldn't be definition or a mental picture.
“The Bean Eaters,” written by Gwendolyn Brooks mainly strikes the reader’s sight. The poem is about a group of poor elderly people who rent out a back room and come together like a family casually to eat beans. “Plain chipware on a plain and creaking wood, Tin flatware,” …show more content…

To emphasize the use imagery in the poem the author uses a lot of repetition. Throughout the entire poem the word “We” is used to describe that there is more than one person doing something. “We Real Cool, We Left School,” (lines 1-2) are the first two lines in the poem and it already describes that the people in the poem are young and they are bad. “We Real Cool” is a good example of how little you can describe but can still have imagery.
The final poem “miss rosie” written by Lucille Clifton has the best use of imagery out of all three of these poems. The whole poem gives the reader a vivid description of an old, senile, African American woman. Lines 13-15 give the reader the image of how old and is and lines 9-10 tells you how she is senile. Even Though the imagery does not directly tell the reader that she is old and senile, the use of descriptive words describes it perfectly. The rest of the poem gives you the entire image of the woman and tells you how the speaker respects her and helps

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